Just pick one! :)
The pastor goes deep into the Word, and I love it. It's rare when I leave church on Sunday unchallenged. In fact, I can't think of a Sunday when that's happened. We just finished up a long series of prayer right before Lent when we as a church entered 40 days of prayer together. In one of his recent sermons, he cautioned us that if we don't learn a lesson that God is trying to teach us, we don't get to skip ahead to the next one. Sometimes in school, even if the concept isn't quite grasped, teachers have to move on, which is unfortunate because often times the concepts build on each other.
Well, God loves us too much to move on without making sure we learn the lesson. The pastor told us that the object in the lesson might change, but the lesson is staying the same until it's grasped.
And I panicked. Thinking, "Oh shoot!! I do NOT want another go around of the stuff God has been working out in me the past year and a half!"
And then I had tangible opportunities to see what God has been doing in me.
A girl in my small group shared that her sister was pregnant with a little girl who was severely underdeveloped and wouldn't survive outside the womb apart from a miracle. This was very sad for me to hear, and I cried on my way home from group that night. My heart ached for her sister, her family, and for that little baby girl. I found out last week that the little baby girl was born and lived 3 days. And then her parents had to release her to Jesus.
A new friend and the mom of one of my students just recently found out that she has a very large mass in her abdomen. She was in the hospital for a few days, and the doctors gave a pretty scary diagnosis. At worst it was cancer, and it could potentially already be throughout her stomach. At best it was a cyst that was so entwined with her organs that to remove it would require taking out pieces of several of her internal organs. It would be a massive surgery. She had a biopsy on Friday, and we're all hoping to get information tomorrow. Her kids are 5, 3, and 1. A potentially very scary situation for everyone.
So I admit that my immediate response to both of these situations was not the best. I dealt with the first one for several weeks before knowing what was going to happen. And the latter I'm certainly anxious to hear the results that will hopefully come tomorrow.
But this I know is true: God's ways are NOT my ways, but He does hear my prayers. There is value in going before my Father and making my heart's cries heard. But I do know with confidence that God is writing a bigger story that I cannot fathom. And in this story, I know what is in the best interest of everyone is for His name to be magnified and His glory made known! And often that can involve pain, heartache, suffering, sorrow, and brokenness. But that does not mean God's character has changed or is any less trustworthy. It's always in our best interest that we are drawn closer to the Father. I just don't prefer for it to be awful things that cause us to know Him better, trust Him more, and love Him more deeply.
Ecclesiastes 3:11 says, "He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God is doing from beginning to end."
The heartaches of life will be made beautiful in its time. And I don't say that lightly or to breeze past raw pain. Because I think there are times I would have hit someone that told me that. Reality is this- I don't get the full picture. I can't see what God is doing from beginning to end. I can't see how God is working things out. I can't always see the beauty in what I would describe as very ugly. And that's okay! I'm not supposed to be able to. But I am able to trust in who God is and who God will always be. He is unchanging and unmovable. His kingdom will not be shaken. And He will reign victorious.
So, I do pray for a good report tomorrow. But I mostly pray that God would draw our hearts to Him and use us to make His story famous.
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